July 2024
Sports is not a common subject matter in this newsfeed, nor is spirituality in sports. But the two came together recently as media reports revealed that NHL (ice hockey) team the Edmonton Oilers’ performance training included it. It appears to have paid off brilliantly.
For the season of 2023–2024, ending with Stanley Cup finals in June, the Oilers hired mindfulness coach George Mumford to work with the players’ inner life. Mumford has helped such stars as NBA (basketball) giants Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.
Behind the bench, Mumford was working with the team on their mental performance, including mindfulness.
“I help people be in a moment more effectively and efficiently,” said Mumford to CBC Radio. “Just be here now.”
The key is observing what is happening, with curiosity and without judgment, Mumford explained, which takes one out of self-doubt and negative thoughts.
“In this context, the most important thing for the team is focusing on winning one game at a time.”
Mumford uses a tool he calls The Four As: awareness, acceptance, compassionate action and assessment.
Did it work? The Oilers pulled off an impressive achievement, climbing from the bottom of the league right up to playing for the Stanley Cup for the first time in 34 years.
“Mindfulness” is a westernized term for ancient knowledge about how the mind works and how to enhance the human experience and to live more fully. It’s about living in the moment, and is associated with the Sanskrit word atha in the yogic tradition or the zen in Zen Buddhism.
This presence in the moment — this “letting go” of perceived pasts and futures — is a prerequisite for enlightenment per various spiritual traditions.
The Oilers’ remarkable achievement through inner work was discussed in a recent episode of podcast Supernatural Circumstances, featuring Dr Eben Alexander and Karen Newell. The team never blamed other teams for losses or other deficiencies. They always tried to reframe and refocus. Host Morgan Knudsen recalled a press conference, where one of the players gave an extraordinary answer to the question how it felt to be booed by the audience:
“What is there to be upset about? What a wonderful thing to be grateful for, that I am in a position where I can go out into an arena and get booed. I am playing for my passion. This is a blessing.”
The Edmonton Oilers was formed in the 1970s. The team almost immediately had great success and won five Stanley Cups between 1984 and 1990. But then came three decades of the opposite: Struggling at the bottom, mostly losing. Perhaps expectation was the psychological culprit?
Why would you achieve more flow and better results if you focus on the moment and don’t think so much about either earlier performance or the outcome? From a materialist standpoint, that doesn’t make much sense. But it works.
If this was once seen as mumbo-jumbo, it no longer is. In recent years, the concept of mindfulness has gained significant popularity at the individual, academic and organisational levels. There are numerous scientific studies showing the benefits of mindfulness – some adding the once controversial term meditation – and also academic calls for it to be introduced among university students.
So why shouldn’t it work in sports? The Oilers fell short of winning the Cup, but with the tiniest of margins. In the best-of-seven games finals, they managed to swing a 0–3 disadvantage to a 3–3 draw, and in the end lost by only one goal. Having started from the bottom of the league, that is a pretty amazing feat. And the spiritual aspect could have played a part.
Anders Bolling
